Is it possible to make a game comedy?

[Blemontea]

At first i was going to say yes but then i read your posts ... and the definite answered turned into a maybe... There are already TONS of dramatic plot line about the protagonist screwing up and causing the apocalypse and when he tries to save it, it only gets worse. but there supposed to be taken seriously and most of the time they are.

the way i see it is the only way it could start walking in the right direction is doing a parody genre game, kinda like a mix between Bayonettas over glorified fighting style and over sexualized character. and then just have a ridiculous plot that even it gets sarcastically serious its still funny becuase of the premise/dialogue/world.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Comedy Games that I can remember

No One Lives Forever - Think Austin Powers with all the Austin Powers bits removed
MDK 1/2
Most of the Point/Click - Sam and Max, Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island, Zak McCraken and the Alien Mindbenders, Discworld.
A lot of the old text adventures Hitchhikers, Rigel's Revenge, Leather Goddess of Phobos

It's very difficult to do comedy that's not text based though, as physical comedy soon gets overshadowed by the repetition. A joke that's told a hundred times (Bugsy Bobcat) gets old very quickly.

 

[Cheesepower5]

You, the omniscient player will lay out various traps and other such goofy situations for the protagonist to stumble upon? It might be worth playing.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

The Gex games, as I remember, were pretty focused on TV satire. Not especially clever, but its the right idea.

 

[GonzoGamer]

It could be done. I don't know if it would be any good but it could be done.
Of course, you wouldn't be the protagonist. More like a third person/god or something like sims. Sim3 could actually be played as a comedy by Flatfrog's standards.
I'm kind of happy it's not done though. The movie games are bad enough. Could you imagine games based on sitcoms?

*Shudders*

Don't get me wrong, I'm not by any standards suggesting that! I can count on one hand the movie tie-ins I thought were any good. Obviously you wouldn't want to actually copy a sitcom, I was thinking more about the structure.

Mostly I've been won over by responses here - you're all correct, I was too limiting in my definition of what constitutes comedy, and I should have narrowed it down a bit to 'comedy of errors'. The whole thing started in my head because I was thinking about the Extra Credits video where they were talking about sex in games, and thinking there's a good reason why it's generally avoided and awful when it's included. And that set me thinking about the 'rom-com' story and how impossible it would be to make an interactive rom-com. And then I thought 'or any comedy'. But I agree I cast my net of impossibility a bit too wide at that point...

So there's a revised and perhaps more interesting challenge: could there ever be a rom-com in game form (or other interactive media)? Leaving aside the question of whether you would want to, of course, but I'd say if you could, there would probably be some people with money that would like to talk to you...

Considering how many Wiimotes are in the hands of housewives it's surprising Nintendo hasn't kidnapped Jennifer Aniston just for this purpose.
Of course you can make a rom-com game. But it would probably end up as shovelware even if they put the resources to make it good because most game purchasers wouldn't dig it.
Just off the top of my head; playing as a matchmaker who has to pair up all her/his single friends for... new years party, wedding, I don't know. You go around finding different preferences but your friends are socially incompetent and need to be steered in the right direction by you.
I bet you there's already a couple of Japanese games like that.

 

[Jack_the_Knife]

I think, maybe no, not like a slapstick comedy. Maybe more of like an absurd comedy like what you're suggesting is already possible, satire, parody or pastiche like TimeSplitters, where the humor just comes from how bizarre or tongue-in-cheek the situation is.

Like, for example, one level involves a Prohibition-era Chicagoan detective and his flapper partner taking on a bootlegging crime lord. In any other situation, it'd be a straight-up dramatic game; but take into account that the detective in question has been Quantum leap'd by a space marine from the future, the over-the-top, unrealistic shootouts, exaggerated animation, pop-culture references and the fact that after the hero accomplishes what he came to do, aliens start teleporting in, well, maybe it's not laugh-out-loud funny, but it's still pretty light-hearted.

Some games just have off-hand jokes, a game can be a comedy when the tone is right.

Just throw in something like a pie-shooting gun or something, it'll be grand.

 

[Lieju]

How about casting the player as the "straigth man"?

You are trying to do something, and the wacky NPC's keep foiling you and acting silly.
This is very common where you have "comic relief" sidekicks who keep falling over and putting their head in beehives and what not while you are doing your best to save the world.

It can be done funnily, but way too often you, as the player just gets frustrated with them, it doesn't work.